Investigators search for cause of Marlborough fire

Fire officials yesterday continued to look for the cause of a six-alarm blaze Monday at a West Main Street condo complex that the Red Cross said left nearly 90 residents temporarily homeless. “The inside is pretty nasty,” Building Commissioner Stephen Reid said of the building at the Lake Williams condo complex...

Fire officials yesterday continued to look for the cause of a six-alarm blaze Monday at a West Main Street condo complex that the Red Cross said left nearly 90 residents temporarily homeless.

“The inside is pretty nasty,” Building Commissioner Stephen Reid said of the building at the Lake Williams condo complex, the top floor of which burned for about seven hours. Firefighters from a dozen departments put out the fire.

Reid and other officials from his office helped investigators as they walked through the 271-277 West Main St. property assessing damage and looking for answers.

At about 3 p.m., fire investigators were perched on the fifth floor of the building, the area used for resident storage, where the fire broke out.

As of press time last night, the fire’s cause had not been determined.

Reid said although the fire was contained primarily to the fifth floor, other apartments sustained heavy smoke and water damage.

He said water damage carries the risk of falling plaster, the spread of mold and mildew and other hazards inside the building.

Reid said a fence would likely be put up around the property later in the day and security officials were around the building to make sure nobody went in.

He said that once the fire investigation wraps up, residents will likely be able to be escorted into the building to retrieve any salvageable belongings.

Other condo units surround the building that burned Monday, Reid said. Residents of the other buildings had been let back in and power had been restored, although officials were still waiting to ensure burning debris hadn’t compromised a gas line to the buildings.

Reid said the ultimate decision on whether to repair the building or tear it down and rebuild would be left to a consensus of the condo owners. He said leaving the building standing and repairing the structure would likely mean gutting the building down to a skeletal structure and rebuilding from there, given the extent of the water damage.

Reid estimated the damage to be “definitely over $1 million but probably under $3 million.”

He also said the insurance claims process for residents could be long and drawn out. Reid said there are still insurance claims that haven’t been settled from an eight-alarm fire on Main Street in Marlborough last summer.

Dawn Leaks, regional communications director for the American Red Cross of Central and Western Massachusetts, said employees and volunteers were still working yesterday with the families displaced by the blaze.

Leaks said the Red Cross has assisted 88 people from 32 families — 66 adults and 22 children — and verified that all those people were displaced by the fire. Earlier reports had placed the number of displaced residents at 67.

Leaks said the agency, staged at the Senior Center on Main Street, had been working with the residents to provide financial assistance for clothing, food and lodging. It also fed lunch to 50 people and dinner to 30 people on Monday.

Page 2 of 2 - Leaks said the city paid for seven families to stay in area hotels Monday night. Most of the other residents, she said, were staying with friends and family.

The condo complex is managed by Phoenix Company, Inc. of Worcester. A woman who answered the phone at the management company yesterday said company officials were busy assisting residents who had been inconvenienced by the fire.

(Kendall Hatch can be reached at 508-490-7453 or khatch@wickedlocal.com. Brad Petrishen can be reached at 508-490-7463 or bpetrishen@wickedlocal.com.)